Readers, you now have 12 hours or so to bid for a slice of computing history: a Kim-1 single-board computer, released some 36 years ago by the company that would become a key part of Commodore.
Kim stood for Keyboard Input Monitor, and the device, based on the MOS 6502, was the equivalent of the Sinclair MK14 or the Acorn …

COMMENTS

I remember a review ..

in Practical Electronics or Wireless World where they jokes that there were a range of peripherals coming along like parallel ports, serial ports, memory expansion and space shuttles - I think MOS had some connection with Rockwell who were the main contractor for the shuttle.

Lovely

Re: Lovely

Vaguely familiar

That looks suspiciously like a board that I had to program (that's how we spelt it then) on a Summer School with the Open University at Bath University in the early 80s.

We had to simulate the cycles of a washing machine, putting the cycle name in the alpha display and also switching on either a red or green LED that were also on the board and and spinning a small motor that was also on the board (looks suspiciously like it's near the bottom left in the picture).

Wonder how many of these the OU have got tucked away at Walton Hall, and if they've got an eBay account.

Re: Vaguely familiar

The OU one was probably a DESMOND: Digital Electronic System Made Of Nifty Devices and used on Technology Faculty courses. There was also a series of Hektor computers (Home Experiment Kit) of which the first was a single board job like the Kim-1, the second had a keyboard and the third was more like a BBC Model B.

Re: Vaguely familiar

I remember my old man spending his evenings slaving over a Hektor. I think the printer noise pissed him off pretty quickly though and he managed to complete his coursework on a BBC with a modem somehow.

Anyhow, there's also a vintage Rockwell dev system up for grabs at the moment which I would have thought was more in keeping with the Reg's Z80 bent of recent weeks. Ebay item 150816504482 for the interested, complete with four 8" drives. (Not mine, I'm more a 6809 fanboi. Don't know the fella, etc.)

Re: Vaguely familiar

I actually used one for a University assignment

This was in 1979 or 1980 (I can't remember exactly - getting old).

Was my first experience of 6502 machine code, which became very useful when I got my BEEB a few years later. Had to code a sine-wave generator using an attached D-A converter. Real pain putting the opcodes directly into the keyboard, with no means of storing the program.

I think that this one must be a later one, because the ones that Durham had not only used a calculator keyboard, but also a tiny calculator display as well, mounted in what I remember to be the top half of a Commodore 8 digit calculator. My memory may be playing up though...

Re: I actually used one for a University assignment

Looks a lot like the ones they had in Durham. I think they were as pictured here.

They were used to teach machine code to 1st year undergraduates in 1979/80 at least. No big deal for those of us who'd already programmed HP calculators. At the time they seemed kind of quaint, although they were presumably quite new. It was just that things were moving pretty quickly.

They also had Acorn Atom machines about, which were much more interesting than these things at the time.

I have to ask.

@TeeCee - More like

Defo used an AIM-65

at Strathclyde Uni during the '80s. IMSC, the electronics club had a cased-up KIM, too. Didn't you have to hand-enter an interrupt vector before using the monitor ROM (for display refresh or something)?